Sleepwalker
by julesmonster
Summary: Harry keeps going to sleep alone in Gryffindor Tower, but that's not where he's been waking up! SLASH HPSS


**Sleepwalker**

Disclaimer: I do not own anything HP related. It all belongs to JK Rowling, Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Inc., Warner Bros., and any other entities involved.

A/N: Written in response to Kerowyn's Snarry Challenge #4 on The Silver Snitch. "Sleepwalking can be embarrassing, as Harry will discover it when he wakes up in Snape's bed, with no memory of how he got there."

Harry wasn't sure how he'd gotten here, or even where here was. What he did know was that he was not alone. He was in a bed of some sort, but it was more comfortable and larger than his own was in Gryffindor Tower. The bed he'd actually gone to sleep in the night before.

Harry refused to open his eyes, afraid of what he would see. Afraid of finding out whose bed he'd ended up in. Afraid that it would be the one person it should not be, but always was in his many dreams.

"Mr. Potter!" the cold silk voice shouted, demanding his attention. "Do not feign sleep. I know you are awake, and you will explain your presence in my personal quarters at once!"

Harry groaned and buried his face in the fluffy pillow he'd been sleeping on so recently. He did not want this. He couldn't. The man was a complete and utter bastard. But Harry's subconscious seemed to disagree. First the dreams, and now this.

"I don't know, sir," Harry mumbled into the pillow.

"Look at me Potter," Snape demanded. Reluctantly, Harry complied. "What do you mean you don't know?"

"I mean, I went to sleep in my own bed last night, but woke up here."

"And you have no recollection as to how you came to be here?" Snape asked skeptically. He was watching Harry's face intently for any sign that the boy was lying.

"No, sir."

"Hm," Snape grunted. "Probably some peculiar Gryffindor's idea of a prank. You will get out of my bed and back to your dormitory immediately. And you will warn the foolish person who perpetrated this…joke…that I have no sense of humor and will destroy him if he even thinks to repeat the performance. Do I make myself clear?"

"Perfectly, sir," Harry said as he got up and made his to the door. "It won't happen again."

The next morning, however, found Harry once again ensconced in the bed of one surly potions master. As soon as he opened his eyes, he was greeted by the sight of deep obsidian eyes glaring at him from above.

"Oh shit, not again!" Harry muttered.

"Watch your language," Snape corrected automatically. "And yes, again. What the hell is going on here?"

"I wish I knew, sir," Harry said. Would it be too much to ask to have one thing in his life that was normal?

"Get out, Potter!"

After a week, Harry had pretty much given up trying to figure out how he had gotten to the Potion Master's bed. He simply enjoyed waking up in the other man's arms. Since the second morning, Harry always seemed to wake up before Snape, and he realized what he hadn't those first two mornings. Snape liked to cuddle him in his sleep. He would hold Harry tightly in his arms, his chest pressed to Harry's back, their legs tangled together.

This was the first time he'd felt THAT though. That was a very insistent erection pressed into Harry's hip. Oh gods, that felt wonderful. Harry wondered what it would be like to be able to touch, to taste that cock without fear of being hexed. His own arousal peaked as the images rushed through his mind.

As soon as he heard Snape begin to stir, Harry feigned sleep. He was getting rather good at it. Snape started when he realized that Harry was once again in his bed. Then he groaned as he noticed the rather insistent problem resting against Harry's hip. Harry had at first expected Snape to simply push him away and berate him for being in his bed once again. So when, on that third morning, he didn't, Harry was rather shocked. In fact, Snape usually took about five minutes to snuggle and carress Harry's hair and face before rousing Harry and tossing him out on his ear. Harry liked to believe it was because Snape rather liked finding him in his bed.

When Snape finally began carefully disentangling himself from Harry, he knew that they were about to begin their other morning ritual. That of berating Harry and all things Gryffindor.

"Mr. Potter!" Harry pretended to jerk awake. "This has to stop. What if someone found you here? I could lose all respect from my peers. Not to mention Albus. Hell, I could lose my job!"

"I'm sorry, sir," Harry said blearily. "I go to my own bed every night. I don't mean to end up here. I checked rather discretely and I don't think it's any of the Gryffindors playing a prank."

"I will have to take measures," Snape said firmly. "This cannot go on. I will change the wards around my quarters. Put up additional security around these rooms. That should put an end to whatever this is."

"Yes, sir," Harry sighed. He really didn't want to stop waking up in Snape's arms, but he knew that it couldn't continue. With another sigh of resignation, Harry left the room.

"How in Merlin's name are you accomplishing this?" Snape demanded the next morning. "Even Albus would have a difficult time getting through those wards! I know you killed Voldemort, but this is pushing it!"

Harry wanted to laugh at the look of frustration on his professor's face, but wisely checked himself. "I really don't understand it, sir. I go to sleep in my own bed and wake up here. I don't remember how I got here."

"Fine, fine," Snape muttered. They had been through this too many times already. "I will come up with something. In the meantime, try to at least wear something decent to bed, will you?"

Harry looked down at the plain cotton pajama pants he was wearing. They were perfectly decent, if a bit too big. They did ride down his hips a bit. But he was wearing more clothes than he would working in his aunt's garden, or swimming in the pond by the Burrow.

"What's wrong with what I'm wearing?"

"There's no…top…and your pants…" Snape spluttered. "Just find a decent set of pajamas! Now get out!"

Harry rather missed the feel of Snape's arms around his bare chest. He'd taken to wearing an old t-shirt with the sleep pants over the past week. It probably wasn't what Snape had in mind, but it was the best Harry could do. He was shut of the Dursley's for good, now, but he hadn't had a chance to replace any of the ill-fitting clothes yet. He would soon, though. Graduation was only a few weeks away. If he could just get through NEWTs, he'd be all set.

"Mr. Potter," Snape said, startling him out of his thoughts. They were in the Great Hall for dinner and they were both consciously aware of the prying eyes and ears around them. "I have been giving that problem we discussed some thought. Come to my office at eight to confer on it. I may have found a solution."

"Yes, sir," Harry said and turned back to his dinner, ignoring the questioning stares from his friends.

"I haven't figured out how you are breaking my wards," Snape admitted later that night. "But I think if we deal with the underlying cause for this situation, we can make changes to stop it."

"Meaning?"

Snape glared at him. "Meaning, I believe that you are sleepwalking due to the stresses of your upcoming NEWTs. If we remove the stress, we remove the need for you to sleepwalk. Therefore you will not end up in my bed."

"So how do we remove the stress?" Harry asked curiously. "I have to take NEWTs, so…"

"I have a potion that will relieve stress," Snape told him as he pulled a vial from his desk drawer. "It is similar to a claming draught, but it will not dull the senses. This will simply keep matters in perspective as you deal with your exams. Take two drops each morning, and two just before bed."

The potion was amazing. Harry found that it removed the worry and anxiety over the exams, leaving an intense ability to concentrate in its wake. Even Hermione was impressed with Harry's newfound studiousness. Harry rather thought he would do well on his NEWTs.

What the potion didn't do was stop his nightly appearance in Snape's bed.

"I want to try a body bind," Snape told Harry the morning before his first exam. "Tonight, after you go to bed, cast a body bind on yourself. Your dorm mates will be able to remove it in the morning, but it should keep you in your own bed for a change."

"Sure," Harry shrugged unenthusiastically. "I'll try it."

Harry used the body bind on himself. Then he had Ron do it for him, which took a lot of explanation that neither of them had enjoyed. Finally, Snape snuck up to Gryffindor Tower and placed the hex himself. All to no avail. Each morning, Harry woke up in Snape's arms, in Snape's bed. And truth be told, he was rather glad the spell hadn't worked.

The fourth morning of Harry's exams, he awoke in Snape's arms, but not in Snape's bed. They were in an unused classroom, on a cot transfigured from an old desk.

The fifth, and last, morning of Harry's exams, he awoke in a bed in one of the guest quarters.

Snape was trying to hide from him, but it wasn't working.

"There must be something I'm missing," Snape sighed in frustration. "I need more information. If I was awake, I could report my findings, but I have tried staying awake with poor results."

"What about an uninvolved observer?" Harry asked.

"We can't very well get someone else caught up in this mess," Snape snapped. "But…"

"What?"

"I'm not sure why I didn't think of this before!" Snape grinned and Harry's stomach did a flip. Snape really was rather attractive when he wasn't being a complete bastard. "I'll use a see-all! It will record your every move as long as you are under its spell. Then we can play back the information and see just how you are pulling this off!"

Harry was rather curious to know how he'd been able to break Snape's wards and follow him to unknown locations. It was almost as if his subconscious had radar that homed in on Snape.

"Okay," Harry agreed. He felt kind of bad for pushing himself on an unwilling partner, even if Snape seemed to enjoy holding him every morning. Just because he had a crush didn't mean that Snape would want to deal with it.

They were back in Snape's quarters the next morning. It was a Saturday, so they had time to go over the see-all's findings without needing to hurry. Sitting in Snape's living room, the two men stared at the see-all as it began to play back the events of the previous night. It started out, boringly enough, with Harry sleeping peacefully in his own bed.

The dorm room was silent except for the soft snores of five teenaged young men. It had to be close to two in the morning before anything interesting happened. The door to the dorm room opened, and in the dim light from the corridor, a familiar silhouette could be seen.

Snape entered the room and went directly to Harry's bed. There was a glassy, unseeing look in his eyes. Snape was not aware of anything but the boy in the first bed. Harry.

Quietly he crept up to the sleeping figure and pulled the covers away. Harry stirred a bit in his sleep, but did not wake. Satisfied, the Potion Master scooped the smaller figure into his arms and swept from the room.

The trip to the dungeons didn't take long, as Snape knew several secret passages to ease the way. There was no one else about that late at night, and without incident, they arrived at Snape's door. Soon, the older wizard was gently laying Harry on the bed and climbing in beside him. Spooning him in his arms, Snape placed a gentle kiss on Harry's unruly mop of hair. Harry sighed and settled into the embrace easily. Snape settled down as well, and they were both soon lost in sleep.

"It was you," Harry whispered in awe.

"Oh my gods," Snape seemed equally shocked by what they had witnessed.

"You love me," Harry stated. It was not a question. The scene they had both watched left no doubt in his mind. Snape, snarky bastard that he was, could not treat anyone as tenderly as he had Harry without being in love with him.

"I- I- I didn't know!" Snape sputtered. "I'm sorry."

Harry just grinned. "I'm not."

Snape looked at him in abject misery and confusion, so Harry continued. "I thought it was me, because I've wanted you for so long now. It was just lust at first, but since I've started waking up with you, I realized that it was so much more. I loved when you would run your fingers through my hair or stroke my cheek when you thought I was still sleeping. I didn't want to find a way to stop this. I didn't want to give up the one thing I thought I could have with you."

"But I've been such a bastard to you," Snape pointed out, but he could not hide the glimmer of hope in his eyes.

"And I've been a prat of a student," Harry admitted. "It doesn't matter. I'm still in love with you." He leaned closer to the man he loved and tried to place a kiss to those tempting lips, but was stopped.

"We can't," Snape sighed. "You are my student. It would be wrong."

Harry grinned again. "As of tonight's graduation feast, I will not be anyone's student any longer."

At this reminder, Snape suddenly smiled and Harry's heart began a staccato beat. "Then we shall wait until tonight."

That night, Snape did not have to fetch Harry from Gryffindor Tower; he was already in Snape's bed, naked, sated, and quite content to be exactly where he was for as long as Snape would have him. And Snape didn't plan to ever let him go.


End file.
